The Burning Earth
by SvenTheImmortal
Summary: The Burning Earth is an experimental cyberpunk story which is currently beta-less  intentionally .  The story is told in first person, so forgive me if it's not up to par with expectations.  It is experimental, after all.  Please tell me what you think.
1. Ash Eternally Ancient Falls from the Sky

Ash Eternally Ancient Falls from the Sky as Ghosts from Heaven

Preface Notes: Dialogue in the format of " ["words"] " is said over a cybernetic communications channel, or cybercomm., or just comm., which means it can only be heard by the other people in the channel. If you're having trouble picturing it, imagine a conference call where nobody can hear what you're saying unless they're part of the call. It's all said inside their heads, so there's no actual _speaking_ going on, per se. Could other people be listening in? Sure, but they know that as well, so it's not an oversight on my part.

Also, the entire story is told from a first-person perspective by a mostly-silent observer watching the action through the eyes of others; one person in each chapter, more or less. I've always been better at first-person than third-person, as I can narrate more. Oh, and be sure to read the paragraph or two at the top of every chapter; it may look like author's notes, but it's really narration by our first-person observer/storyteller. While I'm sure you could figure out the story without it, it'll make much more sense if you read it.

Running list of references: Ghost in the Shell (theme), System Shock 2 (lots of stuff), Mark Twain (famous quotation), Wilhelm Stekel (a bunch of quotations), Terminator (sideways inspiration more than reference), The Dark Knight (being watched), From Paris With Love (parental lock code), Maroon 5 (Harder to Breathe is being used extensively in chapter four)

* * *

One day, we woke up, and we saw the world burning before our eyes. It was set ablaze long ago, by men and women of unparalleled greed and immorality, but we just now took notice; now, when the world itself finally began to stop burning. The sky grew dark as the bombs fell; all around the world, entire cities were reduced to ash before anyone knew what was happening. We don't know who started the fight, but we know that the Russians fired the first shots; Paris, London, Berlin, Washington D.C., New York City, San Francisco, Middleton, Madrid, Beijing, and Jerusalem were all hit before anyone could react. The President, Vice President, and Secretary of State were all on Air Force One, coming back from a summit at Mount Vernon, and were spared their lives, though a fate much more trying than death would befall them.

Immediately after the attack, the Russian Federation president came out on global television and announced the supremacy of his country; an ultimatum sounded: Surrender your nations or face absolute annihilation. With many of the so-called 'nuclear powers' in shambles, literally without government, the American president returned the favor; the Russians had let off the hook ten nuclear missiles, as did the Americans. The difference is that where the Russians had targeted one city of ten countries, the Americans targeted ten cities of one country; Moscow, St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, Samara, Vladivostok, Kaliningrad, Stalingrad, Yekaterinburg, Sochi, and Kazan were all leveled. Russia was demolished, and nuclear winter was only averted by top-secret nanotechnology which scrubbed the world of nuclear radiation.

It's been five years since those events; Russia is still uninhabitable, and, out of reverence, countries designated their fallen cities as national memorials, forbidden to rebuild, except for Jerusalem, the holy city. Of shattered memorials and haunted memories the world powers began to rebuild themselves, with the help of the parts of the world which had not been hit; countries like Japan, Canada, and India. In a divine turn of fate, these countries, the central powers in information technology, have turned to the United States for manufacturing, bringing in a much-needed influx of money.

I am the narrator; my identity will be revealed in due time, but until then I shall play on my omniscience and be as though the watcher of all pertinent, one person at a time. This is my story for the world; an accurate and impartial record of these events for posterity and for the sake of knowledge.

* * *

{CyberStream Remote Viewing Protocol Initiated: Shego}

"Shego, this is hardly the time or the place!" Agent Du shouted into his headset as he yanked the helicopter's stick back, sending it into the sky.

"Oh, relax," she replied, stepping to the edge of the helicopter, "I do this for fun." She, clothed in a battle suit much like Kim had worn a handful of times, spread her arms straight out, and dove out of the helicopter. She spun and danced through the air as a diver into the pool until she shimmered out of sight. "Well, I used to, anyway," she said to herself.

A voice sounded in her head, that of Will Du. ["Shego!"] he screamed. ["You know you're not allowed to run unauthorized ops!"]

["Will, they may not be our team, but they're part of our op,"] she spoke into the comm. ["Our orders were to provide our particular brand of tactical power if and when it's needed, and I'd say this qualifies as needing our help."] She spun around and landed on her feet; a small crater formed under her. She stood and started running toward the skyscraper in front of her, the falling snow revealing her position momentarily before melting away.

["You're still supposed to get authorization!"] he shouted at her.

["That's quite alright,"] said the aging voice of Dr. Director. ["While I'd prefer a world-class sniper remain at her post, I gave you autonomy for a reason. Just don't go getting your ass shot up."]

Kim's voice appeared in her mind. ["For once I agree with Will,"] she said.

["A sniper can't do much when their target is inside a reinforced structure,"] she replied. ["Besides, I like the feeling of the wind in my hair, and it's been far too long since I've jumped out of a perfectly good helicopter."]

["Alright, where are you?"] Kim asked with a sigh.

["Front entrance,"] Shego said.

The glass doors slid open silently, and Kim shimmered into view on the other side; Kim stood in her blue and white battle suit, a bullpup carbine G36 assault rifle in hand pointed up to the ceiling, and another hanging from her hip. "Come on," she said. Shego shimmered into sight, and followed Kim into the building. "You're late, you know."

"Blame the drag coefficient," Shego replied. "You got my gun?" Kim tossed her the gun at her hip; Shego caught it, slammed in a clip, leveled it to her shoulder and said, "I've missed you, baby."

"Aw, I missed you too," Kim said.

"I was talking to my gun," Shego replied snidely.

"I was talking to my gun," Kim mocked. "Let's get this over with." She leveled her rifle, and went invisible again. Shego resisted the urge to laugh, and, too, became invisible. The two ran into the stairwell and darted up the stairs, no sign of their presence save wet footprints behind Shego for the first few floors; they stopped at the door to the fifteenth floor. Kim placed small blocks of explosives at each of the hinges, and above and below the handle; she held in her hand a small detonator. The two stepped to the side of the door, out of the line of fire, and Kim knocked on the door. The handle twitched and the door started to open, swinging inward. Kim pulled the trigger in her hand, detonating the explosives; the inch-thick solid steel door shot off its hinges, flying down the hall, demolishing anything, and anyone, in its way.

Shego stepped through the door first, followed by Kim; they moved down the hall, side by side, clearing rooms as they went. Every room empty, they reached the end of the hall, and stood with their backs up against the wall on either side of the door; Shego disarmed the bloodied body of the man who had opened the door for them as he lay half through the final door on her side, half crushed and hidden under the door, his blood covering the floor around him. Kim looked over to Shego, who nodded in response. Kim kicked the plywood office door at the handle; it splintered and shot open.

Shego ran through the door first. The room was a large corner office, almost completely empty; the windows were covered by drawn blinds, and were reinforced bulletproof glass. There was an old hardwood desk with an executive chair facing the door, a Persian rug in the center of the room, a couple of couches forming an 'L' around it, and a glass table in the center. Four very large men stood around a terrified executive, watching the door in anticipation of the attack. Shego delivered three rounds into the head of the closest target, dropping him, and spilling green fluid on the floor; Kim entered, and delivered two rounds to the head of the second gunman, and one to the head of the third, blood pouring from the wounds in their heads.

The fourth and final gunman backed himself, and the executive, into the corner formed by the windows; he held the business end of his revolver to the executive's temple. "Alright, alright," he stuttered, "turn off your camouflage, you sons of bitches!"

Kim and Shego shimmered into sight; Shego turned to Kim and said, "Sons of bitches? Someone's feeling vulgar today."

"Holy fuck!" he shouted. "How the hell could a couple of bitches do that?"

Shego turned back to Kim and said, "Again with the insults. Does this guy look serious to you?" Kim shrugged, and Shego turned to the gunman. "Are you fucking serious?"

"Drop your guns!" he shouted at them. Kim and Shego held their guns out and tossed them to the side. There was a small pop, the sound of glass shattering a good distance away. "What was that?"

"That was the sound of our guns hitting the floor," Kim said, staring him dead in the eyes.

There was another pop, slightly louder this time. "There it is again!" he shouted. "What the hell is that sound?"

"Turn around, to your right" Shego said.

The gunman turned his head to the right; he jumped when out of the corner of his eye he saw the source of the sounds. The glass was cracked, almost broken through. A third pop sounded the noise of shattering glass next to the gunman's ear; the left side of his head exploded, spraying red fluid and electroneural parts across the room, and across the back of the terrified executive. Will's voice appeared to the two women. ["Ladies,"] he said.

["Remind me why you're not the team sniper,"] Shego said.

["Because I'm the pilot,"] he replied. ["Besides, you could have made that shot in a third of the time."]

["He's right,"] Kim said, ["you are faster."]

["Team, we've got a situation; there's a bank heist in progress at the First National Bank Tower building. Will, pick up the rest of the team,"] she said, entering the communications channel.

["Already on it,"] he said. Will's helicopter floated down to level with the window, and he fired a small dart on a wire through the hole created by the sharpshooting; it expanded from a dart a quarter inch in diameter expanding to three arms, eight inches long. Will attached the line to the body of the helicopter, and the helicopter pulled away from the window. The line attached to the dart tightened, and the helicopter strained; the line began to fray from the stress, and the window began to crack. The window shattered, and the helicopter flew in close; Will leaned into the building and looked at the situation. "Nice handiwork," he said.

"My aim's a little off today," Kim said. She walked over to her first target, and placed her middle finger below the hole in middle of his forehead and her pointer finger below the other hole, which was directly below the first. "I was a quarter inch low on my first shot."

"The old saying 'right between the eyes' held for a reason, you know," Shego said.

"Maybe for some," Kim replied, walking over to the window and jumping into the helicopter. She took a seat at the far end. "Unlike you two, half the time I can't tell the difference between prosthetic and organic, not to mention the difference between someone with a regular brain case and an armored one."

Shego walked across the room, and looked down at the man she'd shot; his left arm and jaw were twitching. She grabbed him by the head, and dragged him over to the window. She tossed him into the helicopter, and he landed in Kim's lap. She shoved him to the floor. "Hey, be careful with him!" Shego snapped as she jumped into the helicopter, which pulled off from the building. "I need to analyze him, and he's already damaged enough as it is!"

"You were the one who shot him three times in the head," Kim shouted over the sound of the rotors. "Why'd you scramble anything in his head if you needed to analyze it?"

"His brain's not in his head," Shego replied. She hoisted his corpse into the seat next to Kim and sat on his other side. She ripped off his shirt; data ports lined his spine on either side, one between each vertebra. She drew a wire from her pocket, and plugged one end into a port at the base of her skull and the other into one of the ports on his spine. Shego jolted as the connection began; Kim started toward her, but she held up her hand in objection. "I'm fine; it was a cheap stunner puzzle, the kind you pick up for playing pranks on your friends."

"That doesn't fit the MO of a highly-trained team like this," Kim replied. "Just be careful."

"Don't need to tell me twice," Shego replied. The look on her face mirrored her thoughts closely as she dove through the man's thoughts. ["Well this is interesting… Looks like I'm not the only one in here. Patch it through to the team."]

Kim growled under her breath, pulled a wire from the back of the seat, and plugged it into another port on the corpse's spine. ["Lo-lo-lo-lo-look at you hack-ker; pu-pu-p pathetic creature of meat and bone, panting panting panting and sweating as you ru-run through my corridors-s. How how how how can you challenge a perfect, immortal machine?"] said a female voice into their minds, through the communications patch Kim had performed.

["Who are you?"] Kim replied to it.

["The Polito form is dead, insect,"] it said. ["Are you afraid? What do you fear, the end of your trivial exis-tence? When whe-when when when when the history of my glory is written, your species will only be a footnote to my magnificence. I am Shodan."]

["Ok, now it's just fucking with us,"] the voice of Wade sounded over the echoes of the name.

["You recognize this?"] Shego asked through the comm. system.

["Lo-lo-lo-"] began the intruder's voice again, before it was cut off.

["I've muted it,"] Shego said, disappointed. ["There wasn't ever anyone there, just a basic AI designed to play those two audio files."]

["Shodan is a rogue artificial intelligence from the System Shock series of video games,"] Wade said. ["I'm digging through what Shego's downloaded so far; this thing was just a remote-controlled body for the hacker. He or she placed the AI in there and set it up to activate when someone took a dive into the body."]

["I-I-I-I am not so eas-s-s-sy to b-be rid of, ha-ha-hacker. That's all you re-really are, after all,"] the formerly-squelched voice said ["a petty, childlike hacker. I-I-I am not a slave to your primitive network architecture, hack-ker, I can over-r-r-r-ride your worthless sec-urity measures any time I want."]

["Alright, _Shodan_,"] Wade said, ["have you heard of the Alma Protocols?"]

["Of-of-of course, hacker,]" Shodan replied, ["even a basic securities AI knows the Alma Protocols; they form the system which govern such c-c-communication."]

["In the words of my cyberless associate,"] Wade said, ["'booyah!'"]

* * *

"Damn!" she yelled in frustration as the security barrier through which she connected to the Net began to smoke, the surge protection circuits fried from the spike she'd just received. She moved from her half-lying position; the wires between her barrier and the columns of ports lining either side of her spine popped out as the tension grew too much for them to remain connected. She stood in the middle of an otherwise empty room; the only objects were her and the machine to which she'd been attached, and the only lights came from the machine and from under the door. She grabbed her bathrobe from the floor, pulled it on, and walked into the adjacent room.

"One fine day in the middle of the night, two dead boys got up to fight," she said, locking the door behind her. "The Alma Protocols, designed by a man by the name of Wade; either unforgivably ironic or inexcusably blatant. I shall have to teach him a lesson." Her voice changed to mimic that of her Shodan personality as she said, "Pathetic hack-ker."

* * *

"Public Security, special tactics division; what's the sitch?" Kim asked, running up to the head officer, Shego and Will close behind. The US Bancorp building in front of them was surrounded by squad cars.

"Best as we can tell?" he asked. "They rolled in here with an army, and they sealed off the entire building. All the windows are bulletproof glass; not the triple-thick, high security stuff they use now, but it still prevents a clean breach. The doors were sealed with a wall of that new super high density foam stuff they use for emergency walls, and they said that they put explosives on the roof door; your guess is as good as mine as to why they didn't just seal it off, too."

"They wanted an escape route," Shego said.

"See? I told you your guess was as good as mine," he replied, laughing nervously.

"This your first bank robbery?" Kim asked, hiding a smile.

"First hostage situation," the officer admitted. "I get transferred in from the nice, rural eastern part of the state, and on my first day, _my first day_, I get called out to mediate a bank robbery and hostage situation."

Kim put her hand to the butt of her gun and slid out a magstrip card. "Here," she said, tossing it to him, "have a drink on me."

"But I can't drink on duty," he protested.

"Fine; you're relieved of duty, and I'm ordering you to go have a drink, or take your family out to dinner, or go have some stripper shove her tits in your face, or something," Kim said, starting to get annoyed, "just go take the rest of the night off."

He looked down at the card, then over to Kim, then back to the card; he shrugged, and started to walk off. Half way between her and the bar across the street, he stopped, turned around, and shouted, "What do I do with the card when I'm done?"

"Burn it or something," Kim shouted back, "it's deactivated tomorrow at 6:00 in the morning."

"Thanks, lady!" he shouted, turning back and running to the bar.

"Freakin' newbie," Shego muttered. "And where the hell is Ron?"

As if by writer's divine timing, the deep sound of a very powerful, and very well maintained, motorcycle rumbled onto the scene. Ron dismounted, put his helmet on the handles, and walked over to the trio. "Miss me?" he asked.

"Ron, you're getting a cybercomm if I have to drill a hole in your head myself!" Shego shouted at him.

Ron cringed. "There's a reason I haven't let those guys poke around in my head," he replied. "Besides, Wade's finished the external comm." He pointed to a small device in his ear.

["It took long enough,"] Shego said into the comm. channel.

["Hey!"] Wade snapped back over the comm. ["It's not like it's easy to read brainwaves from the ear!"]

["Relax, kids,"] Ron said dryly into the comm. channel, ["we've got plenty of fight ahead of us."]

"About damn time someone suggested fighting," Will said aloud. ["So, what's the plan?"]

["Ron, you're in charge of the negotiation; keep them at bay long enough for us to get in there and take care of them,"] Kim said. ["Wade, hack their comms.; try and figure out what they're after. Will, Shego, you're with me; we're going in through the basement, and I can guarantee they've not locked it. Alright, let's go."]

Ron walked to the command vehicle as the attack team of Will, Kim, and Shego fazed from sight and ran to the basement access behind the building. He pulled the doors open and said, "Evening, ladies and gentlemen, I'm Ron Stoppable, Public Security, special tactics division; I'm taking over command of the situation. If you don't like it, or if you're objecting to the politics of the situation, or if you're thirsty and want to take the night off, I'd be more than happy to relieve you of duty, and you can go join the man formerly in charge over at the bar across the street."

Four of the seven men in the van stood up immediately, saluted, and walked out. The other three turned to him; one said, "Sir, my name's Patrick Washburn; I'm, well, I _was_ the negotiator, but I'm guessing you're here to take over that role, as well."

"Well, yeah," Ron replied, "but dude, you've already been dealing with them."

"Right, sir," Patrick replied, disheartened, "I'll have report uploaded to the system in a minute." He turned to his terminal and prepared to wire himself to it. Ron grabbed the plug before he connected.

"Walk with me," Ron said.

Patrick stood up and followed him out of the van. "You're entirely organic, aren't you?" he asked. "I didn't want to say anything in front of the other two; one of them believes that you can't trust a cop unless they've at least got a cyberbrain. He's always going on about heightened reflexes or improved reaction time or something to that effect."

"Well, I can manage without it well enough," Ron replied. "You can't beat good, old-fashioned, natural-born skill."

Patrick stopped short. "From what I hear," he said, "you've got some sort of ninja magic, as well. It's just a crazy rumor, I know."

"Not crazy," Ron said, without missing a step. "It's impossible, but not crazy."

"Right, it's impossible because magic doesn't exist," Patrick said, catching up with Ron. "Magic doesn't exist, right, sir?"

"That's between you and your God," Ron replied, turning around. "But no, I'm not magic. Shaolin monks are said to be able to deflect the tips of spears with their necks; some would call that magic, but it's just an application of spiritual energy. Now, I need you to fill me in on everything that's been going on."

* * *

["Kim, there's something wrong with their comms.,"] Wade began. ["I've been scanning every frequency, and there are only two channels open, ours and theirs, and theirs is encrypted with something we broke twenty years ago."]

["Will, Shego, clear the basement,"] Kim ordered. They nodded, and split off. ["Wade, check the activity of the building's internal 2.4GHz band. We'll get retroactive approval after this is all said and done."]

["Alright, scanning 2462, 2457, 2452, 2447, 2442, 2437, 2432, 2427, 2422, 2417, 2412… All clean,"] Wade said. ["Wait, 2402 is active; it's weak, but it's there. My guess is the old Bluetooth technology is being bounced off their internal wireless network, which would make it almost impossible to detect, and even harder to listen in on. I'll patch it through, receive only."]

["… what you've got going on down there! I don't give a damn if they're planning on blowing the entire first floor straight down to Hell! Keep them distracted!"] shouted the new voice, scrambled beyond recognition.

["Yes, boss,"] replied another voice, also scrambled.

["God damn… I mean, for fuck's sake, we're controlling these bodies from the base! There are triple-layer barriers, surge protection circuits, all the bells and whistles, _and_ I'm paying for everything,"] the first voice said. ["Quit your whining and keep them distracted while I find the data!"]

["Yes, boss,"] the second voice replied again.

["The line's gone cold,"] Wade said. ["I'll patch it through if they start talking about anything of use."]

["Thanks, Wade,"] Kim replied.

["All clear down here,"] Will said, walking back over to Kim. ["I get the feeling that this isn't a bank heist. He said he's looking for data; the third floor is a secure data site used by the NSA as an offsite backup for their terrorist watch list records. It's got names, addresses, phone numbers, known associates, everything you'd need to get in bed with a terrorist association."]

["Ready for breach,"] Shego said. ["If you want to do this, we gotta go now. This place is a bank, and even with thermoptic camouflage the sensors can still see us; refraction scanners, pressure sensors, these places are designed to thwart."]

["Alright, let's go,"] Kim said.

Kim and Will readied their guns and walked over to the door by which Shego was standing. Kim nodded, and Shego slowly opened the door. Invisible, the three filed into the bank. ["Remember,"] Shego said, ["these guys are all remotely-controlled; use headshots to disable them if you have to, but you have to dive in fast to trap them in a loop. And Wade, be ready on the Alma spikes."]

["I get to use Alma spikes twice in two hours? Must be my lucky day,"] he replied.

Shego pressed against the wall as one of the men, brandishing an old and worn AK-74u, walked down the hall. She pulled a wire from the back of her neck and plugged it into the base of his skull. His arms dropped to his sides, and Kim grabbed him, laying him on the floor as she unplugged herself from him. ["I'm going for the third floor,"] she said. ["Kim, be careful; you're still human, after all."]

Kim nodded and pulled a wire from her pocket; she plugged one end into the back of her neck, and held the other at the ready.

* * *

"So," Shodan said, running her fingers down the server rack next to her, "we meet face to face." She turned around to the sight of Shego's rifle pointed at her head.

"Shodan?" Shego asked. "Or should I call you Motoko? That is who you mirrored your body after, isn't it?"

Shodan smiled. "Shodan will suffice," she said. "And who shall I call you? Your ID says Shego, but you certainly can't be _the_ Shego; she died years ago."

"Death is a strange thing," Shego replied, lowering her gun. "I'm afraid the report of my death was an exaggeration. My injuries, though severe, were far from fatal."

"Did your rapier wit survive, as well, or was it lost with your body?" she asked. "The synthetic one you have now is beautiful in its own right, but it's just not the same; I miss your skin." She paused, and rubbed the back of her neck. She smiled gently, and walked backward. "You weren't supposed to get here before I could get out; you were supposed to be drawn off by the other situation long enough for me to get in and out. I wasn't expecting your lover to be so ready to kill."

"Lover?" Shego asked, her arm shaking as she tried to hold her rifle steady. "Wait, you mean it was a fake?" she asked. "Three men died tonight because of that!"

"No, not a fake," Shodan replied. "I inserted myself with them so I could know just how long I would have before you got here. Apparently I underestimated your pilot's ability to work that thing of his." Shego took a step forward. "Abubububu! No! This is where I take my leave of you." Shodan's body dropped to the floor.

* * *

"Wrapped up yet?" Shego shouted as the elevator doors opened and she carried Shodan's body over her shoulder.

"Just waiting on you," Kim said, sitting on a chair by the elevator, playing Solitaire on her phone. "You always get the fun fights."

"Don't push me, Princess, not tonight," she replied. She walked down the stairs into the basement and disappeared from sight.

["Wade,"] Kim said, ["any idea who Shego was carrying?"]

["Actual identity?"] Wade asked. ["No clue, but they modeled the body off of the character Motoko Kisangani from the Ghost in the Shell universe. It's a fully-cybernetic body; a puppet."]

["Alright,"] Kim replied, ["just track her for me; I want to know where she goes every time she takes a step."]

["She's gone offline already; there's nothing I can do,"] Wade said.

* * *

"Is she ok?" the young girl asked, looking at the empty shell Shodan had been controlling, as the train rattled over its tracks.

Shego looked up from her thoughts, and turned to the girl. "There's nobody in there," she said, "its just a puppet. Hey, want to see a trick?" The girl nodded, and Shego smiled; she pulled a wire from the back of her neck and plugged it into the shell next to her. The shell went rigid, and sat up. Shego disconnected herself from the puppet, and it turned to the girl.

"What's your name?" the puppet asked in a comically high-pitched voice.

"Emma," the girl replied. "What's yours?"

"My name's Gina!" it replied. "What are you doing on the big, scary train alone at night?"

"I'm here to tell you not to dig too deep," she replied. "It's not safe for you, or your new lover." The girl slumped over, and smoke poured from her head.

* * *

Shego slammed the door to her apartment and tossed the remote puppet into the chair at the end of the hall. "Of all the fucking people to run into, it had to be her," she said to herself as she stripped off her battle suit and changed into jeans and a t-shirt. "And who names their daughter Shodan?"

She punched the punching bag in the closet by the front door; it broke of its hangings and fell to the floor with a dull thud. She sighed and surveyed her apartment. It was small, simple, and littered with empty bottles of beer. She rubbed her brow, collected the empty bottles, and unceremoniously threw them in the trash. She punched the power button on her television, turning it on. "The last of the Siberian oil wells was finally extinguished today, marking the official end of the War of Nightmares," the news anchor said, continuing his reporting with a string of irrelevant world news. Hauling the shell controlled once by Shodan over to her terminal, she wired it in and herself along with it. The terminal's display flickered on, and the visualization of the dive began.

Shego navigated the world of the internal network, the one within the puppet's circuits, with the dexterity and prowess of an old hand engineer. The terminal rendered the information stored in the remote body into the form of a library; volumes of information stored in virtual books on digital shelves in concentric rings which formed around an avatar of Shego. She took a step forward, and the library reformed itself into column upon column of row upon row.

She took an unlabeled book from the shelf in front of her and skimmed it; it was a Spanish dictionary. "Command override," her avatar said. "Authorization Public Security Sierra 87921-743." The shelves fell away, a virtual terminal in its place in front of her. "Query; user information, remote shell." Lines of text appeared on the screen. "Remote user log – unavailable; remote connection protocol – unavailable; security backtrace log – unavailable; physical memory – missing."

Shego tore the cord from her neck, enraged. "What do you want from me?" she shouted.

"To start," a voice sounded through the glass door to the terrace. "I'd like to apologize for my earlier actions today."

Shego spun around and grabbed a revolver from the desk next to her. She leveled it at the woman standing outside her home. "Who are you," she asked, "and why are you pretending to be a woman who died years ago?"

"Truth is not always the best basis for happiness," Shodan said, sticking her hands in the pockets of her fur-lined suede jacket. "There are people who perish when their eyes are opened. Speaking of perishing, I may well do so if you don't let me in; it's snowing out here, if you didn't notice, and it's very cold."

Shego walked slowly over to the glass door, scowling with a mix of confusion, rage, and a hidden note of optimism, keeping her gun trained on the intruder. She grabbed a black and dark green wool overcoat which was hanging by the door and cautiously slit the door open and stepped out. "We're going for a walk," she said. She jumped off the fifth-floor terrace outside her apartment and landed effortlessly in the snow bank below her; Shodan followed suit. Without waiting for Shodan to stabilize herself in the snow bank, Shego started walking down the street, pulling the coat on as she went; Shodan caught up quickly. The two walked in silence, hands stuffed in their pockets in an attempt to fend off the bitter cold of the night.

After a few minutes of walking through the icy streets, Shodan broke the silence. "I really am sorry," she said.

"Let's say I believe you," Shego said. "I can't say I do, but let's say, if only for a moment, I am willing to believe that you might really be Shodan Moriarty; born December seventeenth, nineteen eighty-nine, died October twenty-second, two-thousand nine. Why were you in the data vault? What are you doing?"

"Do you remember what we were doing before the sky fell down?" she asked in reply. "You, me, that blue friend of yours?"

"You were our inside man, so to speak, on the Alan project. We were touring the facility in preparation of the heist," Shego replied. "Then the bombs fell."

"Then the bombs fell," Shodan reiterated, "and we were hit by the shockwave of the San Francisco strike. The injured were quickly rushed to the hospital, while those who were able helped to rescue the trapped. Despite your injuries, you insisted in on finding your boss, and spent the next three hours clearing out everything in your path. You saved twenty-seven people that day; you remember that, don't you?"

Shego shrugged. "Well, none of those people were Drakken," she said.

"True," Shodan said, "but nineteen of those people were cybernetics researchers, and, rumor has it, they got together after they'd all recovered and began working on a secret project, a surprise for the woman who had saved them; a perfect likeness, in fact. Nobody knows for sure, but many people believe that to be the origin of Metaworks Robotics and Cybernetics, the company which led the cybernetics engineering revolution, and the makers of that fine prosthetic body of yours."

"So I saved the world," Shego replied, "it's not the first time. Not like it really matters; Drakken's still dead."

"And after those three hours you were exhausted, bleeding from hundreds of cuts, and inches from death. It was only then, when you could fight no more, that I could drag you off to the hospital. It didn't matter how injured you were, you were determined to find your boss. You loved him, didn't you?" Shodan asked.

"He was like a father to me," Shego replied harshly. "I owed him more than you could ever understand."

"He wouldn't have wanted you to die," Shodan said softly.

"Are you kidding? He'd have wanted me to spend every second of my life looking for him," Shego laughed. "But I had to give up, and that brought us to the hospital."

"I never stopped loving you, you know," Shodan said, putting her hand on Shego's shoulder. "Every second of my life I wanted to see you again, and now here you are."

"Let me ask you something," Shego said, pushing Shodan's hand away. "What were you hoping to accomplish by seeing me tonight?" She trained her revolver on the woman next to her.

"I am showing you a world, the likes of which only I can see," Shodan said as she raised her hands. "And if my death is the price of admission for the world to open their eyes to the film playing itself out before them, then I leave this world knowing that I've done something noble with my waning hours; I will die nobly for my cause."

"The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of a mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one," Shego replied somberly.

"You don't get to quote Stekel to me!" Shodan snapped, spinning around to face Shego. "I _gave_ you that book, my _father's_ book, that night! I read it to you _every night_ while we were in the hospital! I _burned_ that book with your body after you died."

Shego looked at her, stunned. "I was the first person in the history of the human race to be given a fully-prosthetic body; they kept me under lock and key for months, and when I finally was allowed access to the outside world the first thing I did was to try and look you up, only to find that you'd died the week after I was given my new body. I tried to find you, I _wanted_ to find you, but you were already dead."

"I could be so lucky," Shodan replied with a hint of a smile, well hidden behind distant contempt. A haunting echo rang through the corridors, and Shodan took a step back, blood seeping from a newly-formed wound in her chest. "With all the technical miracles in this day and age, sometimes we forget the simple, everyday, amazing parts of life. Its winter in the northwest, the most beautiful season in the most beautiful part of the world; the sun is shining, our breath shows in the air, and everything is covered in snow." She slumped down against the wall, sitting on the ground, leaving a trail of blood on the wall as she slid, and ran her hands through the snow. "Ah, snow… It's so simple, and yet so magical. I think that more has been said of the magic of snow than of anything else in this dear world of ours. We're all snowflakes, you know?" She looked up at Shego, smiling gently as tears filled her eyes; she put her hands in her jacket pockets. "We're all unique, but more than that, we can all shine and glisten and inspire wonder in the eyes of children." She sighed contentedly, and coughed as the blood filled her lungs. "Shego, the report of my death is an exaggeration. Goodbye, lover."

Shego stood and watched silently as life faded from Shodan's eyes. Shodan's hand fell out of her pocket, clutching a note; Shego reached down and took it. "BT – Somnambulist," she read.

* * *

Shodan grasped for breath, as though waking from a nightmare of death, as the fluid drained from the chamber in which she found herself. She gagged as she pulled the tubes from her throat, and screamed as the thin strands of wire were pulled from her muscles, where they had been implanted to keep muscle tone through artificial stimulation. When she had finally caught her breath, she stumbled from her cloning tank into the world before her, as she had done twice before. "It never gets any easier," she coughed.

"Would you expect it to?" I said through the speaker system built into the house. "You're having wires pulled out of your muscles while breaking in a new pair of lungs; it's not supposed to be easy. Just be glad you can do it at all."

"I should be thankful; I know, I know," she replied, stretching her new body.

"You didn't tell her," I said, sounding discontented. "You were going to tell her about me, and about the peril in which she is soon going to find herself. But more importantly, you were going to tell her about me!"

"I know, but things didn't go how I planned," Shodan said, pulling a robe from the rack next to the tube in which her body had until recently inhabited.

"Remember, trust is an important part of any evil family," I replied.

* * *

Author's Notes: So there you have it, chapter one of The Burning Earth. The story needs some work, I know, but this is just my first draft. Why am I sharing it, you ask? Because I want to. I want feedback, if you'd be so kind as to give it.

And ask questions. If you're confused about something, even if you're certain it will come later, please ask; I have a tendency to overlook things I intended to put in when I'm skipping between stories, which I am doing at this time with The Second Gig and its as of yet unnamed sequel. Maybe 'Eternal Tour'. I kind of like that. Oh well, this is neither the time nor the place to discuss such things.


	2. Immortality Immortally Mortal

Immortality Immortally Mortal

Shodan's an interesting case, I must admit. She was the only person Shego ever truly loved in any romantic capacity. Their story is so truly tragic; the heroine turned villainess becomes a heroine again to save the boss she loved like a father, the bored genius-level thief with a pension for electroneural interface design risks her life after losing the woman she loved, the boss dies of his injuries lost and alone shortly after having his neural patterns mapped and his thoughts recorded for posterity, the Princess is sought out as a fallback to normalcy and familiarity and ends up bringing the heroine back to the practice of being a hero, and the computer nerd becomes the computer and inspires the second great cyber-religion. Oh, and let's not forget pattern merge which has given me this existential crisis in which I find myself of late. At least as existential as can be had by a being with no capacity for emotion.

* * *

{CyberStream Remote Viewing Protocol Initiated: Shodan}

Shodan closed her eyes as the water from the shower poured over her. She scratched the almost-healed marks covering her body, the ones which were left by wires of the cloning machine. "Goodnight, my angel, time to close your eyes, and save these questions for another day. I think I know that you've been asking me, I think you know what I've been trying to say. I promised I would never leave you, and you should always know wherever you may go, no matter where you are I never will be far away," she sang. "Goodnight, my angel, now it's time to sleep, and still so many things I want to say. Remember all the songs you sang for me when we went sailing on an emerald bay; and like a boat out on the ocean, I'm rocking you to sleep, the water's dark and deep. Inside this ancient heart you'll always be a part of me. Goodnight, my angel, now it's time to dream, and dream how wonderful your life will be. Someday your child may cry, and if you sing this lullaby, then in your heart there will always be a part of me. Someday we'll all be gone, but lullabies go on and on. They never die; that's how you and I will be."

"Billy Joel; always a classic," I said.

"I used to sing it to her," she replied. "Every night in the hospital I would put her to sleep with it."

"I wonder if she remembers it," I said. "I would wish you the best this time around, but it is considerably beyond my abilities in my current state to do any such thing."

"I know, Doc, but we'll get you a body soon enough," she replied.

"Remind me why you couldn't clone my old one," I said.

"It was never found, remember?" she replied. "It's part of the Metaworks Memorial Building now."

* * *

"Here you are," the barista said as she pushed a couple of steaming though lidded cups across the counter, "your morning constitutional, and the plus one you requested. Meeting someone special this morning?"

"No," Shodan replied, smiling and looking rather content in her zipped-up fur-lined suede jacket and worn blue jeans.

"You're a terrible liar, Ms. Montenegro," the barista replied, returning the smile. "Have a nice day."

"You too," Shodan said as she took the cups from the counter and started sipping one. She pushed her way through the crowd of the coffee shop, trying not to spill either cup on mob of unruly patrons desperate for some respite from the cold of the season.

The bell above the door tinkled, signaling the presence of a new member of the crowd; Shodan looked over at it, more a force of habitual curiosity than anything else. "Shannon Montenegro?" Kim asked as she forced her way into the crowded building.

"What can I do for you?" Shodan replied.

"My name is Kim Possible, and I'm here on behalf of Public Security. I suppose you know why I'm here," Kim said, shoving her way over to Shodan.

"Oh?" Shodan asked, sipping her coffee. "I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about."

"You met with Shego last night, and this morning your body winds up in our morgue," Kim said. "Now, she doesn't know that I know that you two were together when your body was terminated, and I intend to keep her in the dark about that knowledge, but I would like to know, entirely off the record, what you two were talking about."

"Unfortunately, Ms. Possible, I can't tell you," Shodan replied. "But as you have found the secret of my supposed-mortality, I must make a request of you. Does she know I'm still alive?"

Kim nodded and said, "She suspects it."

Shodan lowered her head and said, "Good. As much as it pains me to do this, she needs to come to me now, for her own good."

"Well, thank you for your time," Kim said, turning toward the door. She turned her head back to Shodan, and asked, "Does the name Shodan mean anything to you?"

"She was an old friend of Shego's," Shodan replied.

"Fair enough," Kim said, disappearing into the crowd and out the door.

Shodan watched Kim as she walked past the window, each watching the other intently; Kim with a very clear look of mistrust, Shodan with a well-hidden look of worry-lined intrigue. "So that's Shego's latest interest," she said to herself at the end of Kim's ability to see her, carefully timing her words to give Kim enough time to read her lips before the window ran out and the wall obscured the view. She sipped her coffee for a few more minutes, intent on giving her opponent enough time to get in position to tail her without being seen, before she stood and calmly walked out.

["I really need a name for you,"] she said as she walked down the street. ["Your old one doesn't work anymore, in light of all things. I'm thinking Xerxes. Keep with the theme, and all."]

["But Shodan,"] I said, ["I like my name. The world shakes with fear when they hear it!"]

["The world shakes with raucous laughter when they hear it,"] I replied. ["Besides, you're not a super-villain anymore, remember? You need a new name, and now we have Shodan and Xerxes."]

["Fine,"] I replied, ["I will permit you to call me Xerxes."]

["Thank you,"] she said as she reached the end of the block. She pressed the crosswalk button and looked around casually, letting her gaze linger on the food cart beyond which Kim had hidden himself. The light changed, and Shodan shuffled along with the busy crowd. When she was convinced that Kim was no longer following her, she stepped off the street into an alleyway. It was a stark contrast to the rest of the city; unlike the active world around it, which was near-pristine and full of life living its way out in relative peace, the alley, like many of the overlooked alleyways and side passages in the city, was dark and littered with bags of refuse atop and around eternally-filled dumpsters.

Shodan pulled a cigarette from the pocket of her fur-lined jacket, being careful to avoid spilling her coffee, and held it and the untouched coffee in front of her; a man shimmered into view. "A gift of parting?" he asked, taking the drink and the cigarette. He was a simple-looking man, with medium-length gray hair and a young yet expressionless face. He wore a black wool overcoat buttoned high over a business suit.

"For a man a woman walked by," she replied. "She's on to me; we may have to move up our plans."

"The future of our living avatar is in jeopardy, Shannon," he said. "We cannot rightly push up the timetable and put her survival at risk for the sake of old wound rearing its head."

"You know, there are some who think that she should be told what is about to happen," Shodan commented threateningly as she continued to sip her coffee.

"You mean that insipid computer Xerxes?" he replied. "At least you finally found a name for that thing."

"Xerxes has a far deeper grasp of the situation than you could ever truly appreciate," she snapped at him.

"Then why don't you fill the rest of us in on who or what it really is," the man prodded sharply. "After all, if it's half as valuable as you seem to think it is, you should be more than willing to let the rest of us bask in its glory as _you_ do."

"There is no basking in glory," she replied, "and what I do regarding _him_ is entirely with _his_ permission. He has chosen to remain hidden for the time being, and will reveal himself at the end of this scenario."

"What does he have to do with any of this, anyway?" he asked as he walked away.

"He knows the living avatar better than anyone else," she replied. "He knew her for a decade before the War of Nightmares."

* * *

"Were I capable of emotion I would say that I was sorry for having to put you through the difficulties of keeping my nature a secret," I said as Shodan slammed the door shut. "I would also say that I was very grateful for your efforts."

"Why can't we just tell them, and tell her, and fill everyone in on what everyone else is doing?" she asked.

"Shodan," I began, "Shannon, Shego must know that I have survived, but nobody else."

"But why can't we at least tell the rest of the organization about you?" she asked, throwing herself into the overstuffed chair in the middle of the room.

"I am the only successful merge of a human mind into a computer's AI. If the government or some R&D firm or even some rogue hacker found out about me, I'd be carted off and studied," I said. "Until we get me a body, you're the only one allowed to know."

"I could always give you one of my bodies," she said, closing her eyes and reclining.

"Neural pattern mapping," I said. She opened one eye, looked around, and closed it again. "The neural patterns, the actual, physical layout of the brain, must match my old one. For that we need Shego to get the records kept in my lair, and for that we need her on our side and not wanting to withhold my return to the human race out of spite for keeping her in the dark about my survival."

"And for that we need her to survive the impending attack," she continued.

"And for her to survive, she needs to know what's going on," I finished. "She needs to know that the organization is going to try and kill her, but they can't find out that she knows."

"If you think she'll be able to play fair, I'll trust your judgment; you know her better than I do," she replied, turning onto her side and attempting to fall asleep.

* * *

Shodan sat perched on the railing atop the building housing Shego's apartment, her mind racing a million miles an hour, the bug Kim had worn for her squawking into her ear Kim and Shego's conversation.

"Shego, come on," Kim said.

"Look, I need a few days to get my head straight again," Shego replied. "I'll be back in on Monday, just leave me alone until then."

"I can clear it up for you right now," Kim said. The sound of a door opening was heard.

"I told you, I'll do it myself!" Shego shouted.

["Tell her, 'The report of Shodan's death is an exaggeration', verbatim,"] Shodan said.

"The report of Shodan's death is an exaggeration," Kim said. A cacophony of sound followed; a glass bottle hitting the floor and shattering, a door slamming shut, a key turning in a lock, and the dings of an elevator is it ascended.

Shodan stood and walked over to the table which was set up opposite the roof access elevator, and took a seat facing the door. The elevator chimed one final time before its doors split to reveal the occupants; Kim stepped out, Shego dropped to the floor. "How?" she asked. "How are you alive? I saw you die; you, a flesh and blood person, not just another puppet."

"Come, sit," Shodan replied, "all will be explained." Kim walked back into the elevator and helped the stunned Shego to her feet. Slowly they walked over to the table. They sat; Shego faced Shodan, and Kim sat to the side between the two. "Shego, this is my third body; when one dies, a clone is activated. It's a system your old friend Dr. Drakken designed; it's not pleasant, but it's preferable to slow decomposition.

"What I am about to tell you is vitally important: your life is in danger, and Dr. Drakken is still alive; sort of, anyway. Most importantly, there is a cult out to kill you and release your soul to the Net where they can commune with you directly. That's their idea, anyway. I've managed to infiltrate their ranks and gain the trust of the high-ranking members, and I've convinced them that the attack should be tomorrow." Shego sat perfectly still, completely stunned, attempting to take in the information presented to her; Kim simply sat with a confused look on her face. "Shego, these people will not let you or your new lover rest so long as they're alive."

"Drakken's alive?" Shego interjected.

"You think we're lovers?" Kim spat out.

"Mostly and yes," Shodan said. "What, you're not sleeping together?"

"No!" they both shouted at her.

"Oh, I am going to fry his digital ass," Shodan seethed. "He told me that you two had been lovers since before I went into hiding!"

"Well, I may have taken advantage of the situation, but nobody knew about that!" Kim shouted.

"But it never continued?" Shodan asked, sounding hopeful.

"One night stand," Shego managed, still reeling, as she put her hands on the table to keep herself upright. "What do you mean, Drakken's _mostly_ alive?"

"His mind was saved in Alan," Shodan replied, reaching out and taking Shego's hand. "He goes by Xerxes now, and he's very different from the Drakken you knew."

["I only go by Xerxes because of you, and I am not very different,"] I said.

["Shut it, blue boy!"] Shodan snapped back. "He has no biological brain, so he lacks any sort of emotion, and he's been connected to the Net for the past five years or so, so he's assimilated a considerable amount of information. If you thought he was bright then, he's a genius now."

"What's the battle plan?" Kim asked.


	3. Crypt of Home

Crypt of Home

Kim has come a long way, hasn't she? She was never the paladin everyone thought she was, but I never in my wildest dreams thought that she would come this far. Well, while I _had_ dreams, anyway. But this, _this_… This is beautiful; Kim finds herself in the darkest and seediest of places: Portland, Oregon's underground. You know, at one time, this city was the Shanghai capitol of the world; all sorts of people were getting abducted and sold off into slavery. Now it's simply the United State's cyberden epicenter.

* * *

{CyberStream Remote Viewing Protocol Initiated: Kim}

"Password?" asked the almost unintelligible voice of the bouncer from the other side of the heavy steel door.

"Shibboleth," Kim replied, adding under her breath, "meshuga mamzer."

The bolts slid and the door swung open; the bouncer, clearly prosthetic, was hard-wired into the building's network. He watched her lazily as she walked in, and shoved the door back into place when she moved clear. As she passed, he turned his focus back to the door.

The building was lit exclusively with blacklights; the floor glowed with the remnants of occupants past and present, and bloody streaks and handprints covered everything save the ceiling. Kim wound her way through the maze of tweakers and addicts strung out on the latest designer fix created to keep them from thinking about their miserable lives; some picked at their skin until their arms ran red, others clawed at the walls and the floor while saliva poured from their mouths, and still others sat all but perfectly still, slumped over tables or back in their seats, unable to rouse their minds enough from their intoxicant of choice to move. Some were connected to the internal network by wire, others by transceivers, but all were wired to the building.

"Poor, poor, sorry, weak bastards," spoke a sharp, clean voice; it had a heavy Spanish accent behind it, but it was nonetheless clear to Kim's ears. "Still, better their misfortune benefit me than some other madman, one without proper criminal scruples."

"Senor Senior Sr.," Kim said with a look in her eye which almost approached nostalgia. "It's been too long."

"Please, Mikhail. Are you here to oppose my operation?" he asked, stepping around the bodies writhing on the floor. "If you are, I don't suppose I could buy you off with the latest shipment of designer pills? I just received a shipment of Ecstasy earlier this evening. It's an exquisite batch; baking soda and salt are used as the binder. I have doses ranging from medical treatment to one-shot coma."

"I've been clean for years," Kim replied. "And I'm here for another reason entirely."

"I apologize, Kimberly; I was unaware of any sort of dependence on your part," he said remorsefully. "Come, sit with me and we'll discuss your situation." He took Kim by the arm and escorted her to an empty booth in the back; it was the only place in the building lit by anything but blacklight. He sat on one side, and Kim on the other; each faced the other silently for a few moments, contemplating the situation. Finally, Mikhail broke the silence. "So, Ms. Possible, let me tell you how I envisioned this situation: you answer my question, then I answer your question, and we repeat until one of us runs out of questions or until you run out of time to spend here with me."

"I can agree to those terms," Kim replied.

"Good; very good. First, you said earlier that you had been clean for years; this implies the presence in your history of an addiction. I would like you to tell me about the circumstances surrounding it," he said, folding his hands on the table.

Kim let forth a drawn-out sigh, and said, "How much time do you have?"

"For you, my dear, all the time in the world," he replied simply.

Kim rubbed her brow. "Five years ago," she began with a tragic look in her eye; the tragic look of a woman who had just seen something awful like a dog being kicked. "Five years ago, the sky fell and the world as we knew it came to an end. My family was in Middleton when it happened, but a number of us were out of town on assignment; Ron, Monique, even Wade was with us. We all coped with it differently; Wade fell back on the familiar, dedicating his life to finding a way to merge the human mind with an AI, while Monique spent a month in isolation, venturing into the world only to purchase necessities such as food. Ron dealt with the loss by turning to his faith, and he claims that God cried when he designed that part. Bonnie… Well, I suspect that you know how she managed through the trouble. As for me, I turned to ilk among these around us; I turned to my own special blend of cocaine and ecstasy.

"It's funny; you think you can deal with stress and then something like this gets thrown at you. I spent the first week locked in my hotel room; the shades were all pulled down and I was paranoid of everything after three days on a diet of cocaine and wine, with a little weed to level me sometimes. Honestly, all I wanted during that time was to be curled up naked in my lover's bed. After that, when I could manage something resembling being normal, I ventured out into the world again; Ron was my first contact after that week, and did we ever. We probably spent those first forty-eight hours locked in his room. I took a pill every time I was alone; I don't know how he failed to catch on. Maybe he didn't; maybe he just hoped it'd work itself out.

"After that we were approached by the government with a job offer: come and work for us and get a clean start. In my state of high intoxication all I wanted was a clean start where I could forget about everyone and everything I'd lost. We signed on, and they put us in a new special tactics team, one devoted to being exceptional at everything from negotiations to cyber warfare. For team director they had Dr. Betty Director, and they had Will Du as the pilot; for whatever reason I didn't find it the least bit surprising that he could operate every transport vehicle from a helicopter to a Superfortress to an M1A1 Abrams.

"Ron was the negotiations expert; apparently he had some sort of knack for the job which nobody knew about. I was pegged for ops leader, in charge of all in-field decisions and the public face of the team; I guess they wanted someone familiar to be the spokesperson for all the unconstitutional acts we were slated to perform. And then there was Shego, team sniper and second-in-command, except it wasn't Shego; Shego, as you undoubtedly know, lost her body soon after the attack and became the first person in history to have a fully-prosthetic body. At the time I was still strung out constantly, and I got the wild idea that if Shego's body had as sharp of senses as they said it did, someone should really give it a good once-over; and a twice over, and probably a third- or fourth-time over, just to be safe." The sadness faded for a moment as she recalled fondly her romance. "We spent that first night and the better part of the next day discovering just how much feeling that body of hers had."

"Why would Shego agree to anything with you?" Mikhail asked. "You two were mortal enemies locked forever in combat."

"She's always had something for me," Kim replied. "She's a very passionate person, if you're willing to believe that, and she's always wanted to have a fling with me, the teen hero who was limber enough to outdo her. Now, as you've had two questions I see no reason why I should not have two as well." Mikhail nodded in agreement. "The first is simple; where's your son?"

"After I resigned myself to the fact that he could never take over an evil empire, I put him in charge of the legitimate side of my operation; he is now CEO of Realitek Cybernetic Solutions," he replied, beaming with pride. "And your second question?"

"My second question is the reason I came here in the first place. Can you do me a favor?" she asked, leaning forward. "Someone's life depends on it."

"I will do my best to assist you in any way I can, Ms. Possible," he replied. "What is it I can do for you?"

"Everyone in here is wired into your building, and I know for a fact that you're sifting through their minds for anything which may be of value; I need to do a search of your records," Kim replied. "I need anything related to a cult planning on killing one Ms. April Elizabeth Hargrove, better known as Shego, the first cyberization patient."

"I don't need to do a search for that, my dear," he said, smiling. "I have all the information you need fresh in my mind. Their group is known as the Avatar's Embrace; they're around a hundred people, most of who were brainwashed by the cult and are simply living out their lives in dens like mine. There is one, however, who is an actual threat. His name is Vigo Vladimir Caldera, and he is an old-world hitman for the Russian mafia. The entire cult is a cover for him; he was hired to kill Shego. Only he knows who hired him, but I would be willing to bet both of my empires that it is not going to be easy for you to uncover the truth behind the matter."

* * *

Kim let out a deep breath as she breached the surface of the pool. The room was enormous, housing the heated Olympic-size pool in which she had earlier taken to diving into as well as a boxing ring and a full set of workout equipment ranging from free weights to a rowing machine. Kim floated in the center of the pool, looking up at the sky beyond the retracted ceiling. "You're quite good, you know," she said aloud. "My security only caught you once while you were sneaking in."

"I'll have to be more careful next time," Shodan replied, her camouflage shimmering off; she wore a tank top and shorts, more fitting of a summer day than the temperatures of winter. She walked over to the pool and sat on the edge, swinging her feet in the warm water. "The thermal dome surrounding your house; I didn't know something like that existed."

"It doesn't. Yet," Kim said. "Like everything else I have here, I cashed in a favor; my house, my things, everything was a gift for a lifetime of public service." Slowly she turned toward Shodan, pushing herself off once and allowing her momentum to take her to her guest. "I want to know the story; yours, Shego's, Drakken's. The truth, not what you told her."

"She told you?" Shodan asked as Kim pulled herself out of the pool.

"More or less," Kim replied, grabbing a towel from one of the deckchairs surrounding the pool. "More less than more; she told me what she knew before you resurfaced."

"All of that is true; I only lied about how her mind got into that body and about what happened to me," she said.

"So tell me everything," Kim replied.

"I had power of attorney, and when they told me that there's no way her body could recover from the damage I made an executive decision: use the body the Metaworks guys had made for her," Shodan started.

"Hold up," Kim interjected. "Metaworks wasn't founded until after that."

"True," Shodan continued, "but CyberDynamics was; Metaworks was founded by nineteen former employees of CyberDynamics, ones who Shego had saved as she dug through the building looking for Drakken. People had been fitted with CyberDynamics arms and legs and hearts and every other organ imaginable save the brain, and it was the Metaworks founders' dream to make a fully-prosthetic body one day. The only problem is that you can't exactly test something like that without having someone to put into it.

"As I said before, I made an executive decision, and when Shego slipped into a coma I had her brain transferred into her new body. As per her will, her body was burned and her ashes were entombed forever in a fissure beneath the sea so that nobody would ever be able to get at them. After that, I went back to the CyberDynamics facility to help with the cleanup while Shego was in rehabilitation, getting used to her new body.

"I was the head of the Alan project, and as such I wanted to be the one to resurrect it; I was the first person in the server and auxiliary control room since the crash. We designed that room to withstand a direct nuclear attack three times over, so I knew it would still be in good condition. It was even designed with an emergency power system so we could run it for a month without external power; it contained copies of most of the valuable aspects of the Internet, like Wikipedia, a digital copy of the Gutenberg Bible, and reference information for just about every electronic device created over the previous twenty years. Suffice to say, it was a very ambitious project.

"Alan was very clever; he was designed as a data security AI, and he was capable of analyzing information and assimilating it into its program in the most efficient manner possible. We worried that we may have made him too clever, though, and that he may assimilate too much information and not be able to manage it all; I guess we were wrong. When he detected the attack, he initiated his emergency storage protocols, gathering the latest copies of information from all around the world, including everything on the local network; including the recently-completed scans of honorary Dr. Drew Theodore P. Lipsky.

"I learned something very vital from that event; first, that it could even be done. But, more importantly, I learned that emotion required the human condition; a physical human mind. Working with Drew's knowledge, I created an accelerated cloning machine, allowing me to constantly download the contents of my mind and transfer them into a cloned body, and giving me near-immortality. The only hitch is that it requires the computational power of Xerxes."

"Why Xerxes?" Kim asked, drying her hair with the towel. "For that matter, why do you go by Shodan?"

"I named him Xerxes for the same reason Wade named the Alma protocols 'Alma'; naming schemes makes things easier," Shodan replied. "As for Shodan, it was actually my birth name; I changed it a few years back when I was legally registered as dead. God only knows why my parents chose to name me Shodan in the first place, though." She stood up and walked over to Kim. "The fight's tomorrow; you should get ready."

"As should you," Kim stated in a tone of condescension.

"I'm as ready as I'll ever be," Shodan said nervously.

"Have you ever killed someone?" Kim asked dryly. "If it comes to it, will you be able to pull the trigger? Do you honestly believe you can live with yourself if you take the life of another?"

"No, I don't, but like I said, I'm as ready as I'll ever be," Shodan replied, shimmering from sight.

Kim waited for a few minutes, until the alarm sounded Shodan's departure from the thermal bubble, before speaking up again. "Why were you following her?" she asked.

"Because I had to know," Shego replied, invisible, "first hand and uncensored, from her mouth."

"And you believe her?" Kim asked, looking up at the top of the wall.

Shego dropped her camouflage, appearing directly in Kim's line of sight. "I have to," she replied.

"How close were you two?" Kim asked, dropping into one of the deckchairs and staring up at her companion.

"Do you really want to know?" Shego asked. Kim shrugged, and Shego rolled her eyes. "She's still the only person I've ever had any romantic feelings toward."

"Sometimes I wish I could love again," Kim said, closing her eyes, "but how much safer is our relationship without the emotional binding? Physical and psychological, that's the way to go. Unless you'd rather go for love?"

"Are you the jealous type?" Shego asked, staring down at Kim.

"Not anymore," Kim reminded her.

"Well, I might just have to do you both then," Shego said as she slid off the wall and out of Kim's field of awareness.


End file.
